Oral symptoms at menopause - the role of hormone replacement therapy

Objective. A questionnaire was used to investigate the prevalence of self-a ssessed sensations of painful mouth (PM) and dry mouth (DM) in menopause-ag ed women. Special attention was paid to the association of the use of hormo ne replacement therapy (HRT) with oral symptoms. Our hypothesis was that wo men using HRT have fewer oral symptoms than those who do not use HRT. Study design. Patients were selected from among 50- to 58-year-old women at tending a communal mammography screening program in Helsinki, Finland. Ever y fifth woman was offered a structured questionnaire. Results. Completed questionnaires were received from 3173 women (response r ate, 65%). Of the total sample, 46.8% (n = 1486) used HRT. The occurrence o f PM was 8.2% (n = 259) and DM, 19.9% (n = 631). Climacteric symptoms were reported by 24% (n = 761) of the total sample and by 19.2% (n = 285) of the HRT users. According to logistic regression analyses, climacteric symptoms were found to be predictive of PM (P = .000) and DM (P = .000). The use of HRT also increased the occurrence of PM (P = .03). However, as a single co variate in our statistical model, the use of HRT was not a predictor of PM. The use of HRT also did not correlate with the occurrence of DM. Conclusions. The occurrence of PM and of DM seemed to be associated with cl imacteric symptoms in general, and the use of HRT did not prevent the oral symptoms studied.